Hiya, my lovely people! It's slowly becoming that time of year again where for many of us the hours of daylight we get are reducing. Perfect time to curl up underneath a blanket and read the latest tech blog! If you're new to these series, you may be wondering what the technical updates are all about. In short, it's a blog series posted every two weeks with an overview of updates regarding the platform, going from public-facing bug fixes, experiments that are being held, and product releases. It's a good place to be to stay up-to-date about what's happening on the platform. If you have questions or remarks about anything mentioned in the blog or a specific thing you're experiencing, don't hesitate to speak up in the comments about. With that all said, let me give you a rundown of what happened the past two weeks.
We recently introduced template documentation for the StructuredQuote template, though by doing so, we inadvertently created red links due to the example we used. We ran the bot again to fix this. However, there are still about 600 wikis where we need to do a manual review and fix of the issue.
Blog posts unintentionally became editable to everyone, rather than just the author and the wiki moderators. This has been rectified.
"My contributions" in the profile dropdown now reads "My Contributions" to keep a consistent capitalization style.
Fixes in Development[]
The default Structured Quote template holds several line breaks between the code and the start of the template documentation. This causes issues on pages, so the bot will be running again to fix this issue.
[Team Rename] Engagement is now Consumer Tools: This doesn't change anything for Fandom users or your experience, but the team that was previously called "Engagement" will henceforth continue its work under its new name "Consumer Tools". This is done to better reflect their work internally to other Fandom teams. Under their new name the team will continue to focus on providing exceptional utility to Fandom users by supplementing the vast content of wikis with new unique tools accessible to everyone.
Example of an Interactive Map with lots of markers that will benefit from this test
[Test] Improved Interactive Maps rendering performance: So much has been happening with Interactive Maps over the course of the year, from adding tooltips, better ways to embed the Maps on pages, to now improving the overall rendering performance. Currently being tested on 10% of all wikis that are using Interactive Maps, the new system aims to render the Map markers based on canvas to avoid the Map freezing (especially when there are a lot of markers) and other issues that the current system is facing. With this new system, your interaction with the markers will go a lot smoother. Curious about how it works? Check out this Map on the Far Cry Wiki as a prime example of a Map with loads of markers. One thing to know: this update makes the Interactive Map incompatible with the MapsExtended dev script. As such, wikis currently using the script have been excluded from the test and future update, and those having received the update won't be able to install the script afterward. Once we're ready to release this sitewide, a blog with more details will be released, so stay tuned!
[Release] Universe Pages: A Universe Page is a centralized hub on Fandom for popular topics in entertainment and gaming, particularly those with multiple variations or interpretations. The page is curated by Fandom staff and links to related wikis and other Fandom sites like GameFAQs and Metacritic. The goal here is to complement and enhance the wikis you all created, acting as a gateway to the depth and detail you've meticulously curated. Universe Pages are optimized to rank highly in search results, specifically for more general keyword searches. This increased visibility will drive more traffic to your wikis, where they can engage with your in-depth content and passionate community. Think of them as the introduction, sparking curiosity and driving fans deeper into the world you've built on your wiki. Read more on the introduction of Universe Pages
[Product Release] Mobile Drawer: A big focus this year, the User Experience Team has been experimenting with a mobile drawer. If this term does not ring any bells, feel free to check out some of the past experiment announcements for it: Mobile Drawer, Mobile Drawer Variations, Mobile Drawer - Persistent User Setting, and Desktop Drawer V2 and Mobile Drawer V1 Validation. In short, the mobile drawer is a feature that is only visible to logged-out users on mobile and aims to entice low-engagement users to stay around longer and visit more pages on the wiki by showing them widgets such as "Others Like You Also Viewed" and "Popular Pages". All the mentioned experiments proved that it does so successfully, though only for users who otherwise would've left after that first pageview, not for those who already browsed more. As such, the drawer is being productized and will go live next week. To avoid being too intrusive to those not needing the help, the drawer will be shown in its open form for the first 5 pages and then it'll collapse by default (unless the user decided to collapse the drawer earlier).
That's it for the past weeks! Per usual, if you encounter something that feels off about the platform, please report it by sending in a bug report, reach out to your Community Manager, contact the Product Support Owner on their Wall/talk page, or just simply sound off in the comments here. Remember to include a link to where you're experiencing the issue, a screenshot if it is something visible, as well as steps to reproduce your issue. As always, thank you for helping us by continuing to communicate. Happy editing, everyone!
Lostris is a Senior Product Support Manager. When not online, she lives to travel, play roller derby, and escape the world by watching anything that has a good plot, good acting, and preferably a ton of sassy one-liners.
